1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to a novel diploid Lolium multiflorum line and a method of using the same to produce dihaploid homozygous Lolium and Festuca species.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Turf and forage grass cultivars are essentially germplasm synthetics segregating for a multitude of genes. Most if not all forage grass cultivars are developed from traditional mass, phenotypic recurrent or half-sib selection methods. However, the availability of homozygous lines, also called inbred lines, can provide completely new approaches for breeding and grass cultivar development. In one application, such dihaploid lines could be utilized for F1 hybrid development, taking advantage of the power of heterosis to increase biomass production, increase stress resistance, increase insect and disease resistance, etc.
However, the successful, reproducible development of such hybrids would require the availability of true breeding, homozygous dihaploid parental lines. Currently, the only techniques for generating homozygous dihaploid Fescue is through the use of anther-microspore culture, followed by genome doubling techniques. These techniques are time consuming, labor intensive, and unpredictable due to the unknown genetic predisposition that a segregating germplasm may exhibit toward such culture and genome doubling techniques. Essentially, this is an unpredictable approach for the generation of homozygous lines since only trial and error, and experience can be used to determine which particular cultivars are amendable to such a technique.